Can I Sue Uber for Overcharging? Someone Else's Account Used to Order/Paid by My Card

[samsmoot]

I had my stepdaughter order some food with Uber Eats on her mobile using my bank details. The order was missing items to the tune of £3.50.

My question is: do I have the legal right to recover this money in a County Court, being as it wasn't me who formed the contract?

Uber will only deal with the person holding the email address associated with the order. This is impractical for my stepdaughter to do - she's busy with kids, probably had to create a password which she won't be able to remember, will need me to send lots of info maybe, will have trouble arguing with them if they don't resolve it easily etc.

So really it's me who needs to get the overcharge back. They've had the letter before claim but I wanted to be water-tight before I made it. It seems simple enough: Uber have my money so they need to pay it back to me. I have the receipt for the order, details which Uber must also have and should be able to correlate, along with the bank transaction, and they could phone my stepdaughter so as she can give me permission to act on her behalf, but they won't do that.

I feel that a court, if were to go to a hearing, would see it as being fair enough that I am the one seeking the repayment, but would there be any reason Uber could put forward which would disqualify me from being the Claimant?

[Amethyst]

Just ask your stepdaughter to log in to the account that the items were ordered on and put a request for a refund through for the missing items. It's not hard to do a password reset if she can't remember it, but if she did it via the app it would likely auto log in anyway.

https://help.uber.com/restaurants/ar...6-96ca77682dd2

[samsmoot]

Thanks. I didn't want to bother her as she has already told me that the email address she used was an old one and she hasn't got the password. So if she couldn't log in first time she probably won't be able to if they resend it to that email.

But I suppose this would be less bother overall if it did work so I will get her to see if she can get it done. I just have the feeling that it won't be easy to get the refund without some fuss, but thanks, yes, I'd better at least get that tried in case it does work as it should.

[efpom]

To issue proceedings so as to recover £3.50 is madness.

[Amethyst]

Indeed.

The court would expect you to have tried the standard routes and follow the complaints process first - court should be a last resort. It is also your stepdaughter that holds the cause of action as she has the contract with Ubereats.

[samsmoot]

Yes, Amethyst, thanks. I see that she must be the one with the agreement.

I did suggest a few times she try and sort it, but so far hasn't. So I'll write this one off.

[samsmoot]

To issue proceedings so as to recover £3.50 is madness.

May as well, for the sake of completeness, answer this.

It's only academic, as I won't be making a claim.

I would also have claimed for stress and inconvenience to the tune of around £50. Court claim issue fees were mentioned, along with Litigant in Person costs @ £19 PH, hearing fees, their costs etc.

Normally this would get my £3.50 back without any claim being needed.

This is usual procedure for me. I don't know how many of you on here encounter consumer problems very often, but I do. So I end up having to either let it go or pursue it if I'm up against a bad business. Sometimes I'll leave it, sometimes I won't, I can be a bit of a nightmare, really, if I decide to pursue something - I'm very tenacious.

I'm pretty flexible with decently run businesses - rarely would I leave negative feedback, for example. And I know mistakes happen and always allow them to get fixed. Unfortunately some people just don't get it - until they receive a legal notification, which often opens their eyes to what the issue is all about and what the consequences will be if it remains unaddressed.

[ostell]

In small claims you can only claim for your loss and not for your time or stress.

[samsmoot]

In small claims you can only claim for your loss and not for your time or stress.

I'd contend that that is an inaccurate statement - you can claim for anything you like. Not getting it may be likely, I would admit.

But that's not the point - it's all about adding up figures so they reach a massive and scary total sum. If I have genuinely been stressed and inconvenienced I do expect compensation for it, and that's what normally results after mentioning how much it could cost if it went to court.

Anyway, playing by 'the rules' isn't something I'm prone to do with the civil (or criminal) justice system. If you play by the rules you will be constrained by them - which is fine for legal professionals. But individuals can be inventive and actually can have a larger tool-set and therefore a lot more power - because breaking those rules won't get you sanctioned like it would with a legal pro, or in trouble with your client or the judge.

Legal professionals can be stuck in their ways to the extent that novelty is an unknown concept, and it can often be their undoing.

[lgfa92]

because breaking those rules won't get you sanctioned like it would with a legal pro, or in trouble with your client or the judge.

Courts will sanction a litigant in person in the same way as they will any other party to a case, the fact that a person is representing themselves gets very little leeway these days. Judges will just as happily rule against a litigant in person for a mistake or gaming the system in exactly the same way they would a professional.

[samsmoot]

Fair point to make but I meant in a more general, procedural way than specific breaches of the CPR or whatever. Things that solicitors aren't taught or wouldn't think to do.

One of them, a potential representative for a Social Security Tribunal, had been emailing me, and I mentioned I had not long ago used a Part 8 Claim to make the DWP return unlawful benefit deductions: he said I couldn't use that procedure for that thing. I guess the judge must have made an error when he made judgement in the Claimant's favour.

And would any legal professional threaten a Tribunal Clerk with a civil claim for malicious falsehood? The DWP said a particular document was valid for Appeal purposes, the Clerk said it wasn't. Given the fact that someone was lying both parties were threatened and a judge used his discretion to 'deem' the document valid, and so the Appeal could then go ahead.

On the criminal procedure front, I got a written defence into the hands of the prosecuting barrister 10-15 minutes before the hearing was due to start, which was an appeal in the Crown Court against a summary offence conviction by way of a Magistrates' Court. The Defence was so devastating that it caused people to change colour, but that's not the point: had this document been submitted even half an hour earlier the prosecution would not have panicked so much and may have been able to steady themselves sufficiently to extract themselves from their hole. As it was they turned to jelly and got who knows what from the judge in the end. And another thing here: the prosecution assumed, and stated that, any Defence needed to be submitted within a certain time period. This is true for Crown Court cases, but not for appeals from the Magistrates' Court, and so they wrongly assumed that there would be no written defence allowed. The judge had already read it.

[vijayasree5]

In fact, you could have tried another alternative by asking your stepdaughter to reset the password or contact the customer care so they can sort this out. Their representatives would better give you a suggestion on the possible solution to your lost money.

[samsmoot]

In fact, you could have tried another alternative by asking your stepdaughter to reset the password or contact the customer care so they can sort this out. Their representatives would better give you a suggestion on the possible solution to your lost money.

As I say, I've given up, but thanks anyway. Some people just don't have space in their lives to remember to chase everything up, and I'm not going to pester her anymore. I just left a negative review somewhere instead and won't be using that service again.